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4.25 AVERAGE
4.25 AVERAGE
Loved the book. It was so interesting to hear the first hand experience on the ISS, as well as the personal journey Scott took to get there.
The time jumping back and forth was a bit off putting, as I would have preferred it go in order, even more of a part one for before and part 2 for after, however overall it was a smooth read.
The time jumping back and forth was a bit off putting, as I would have preferred it go in order, even more of a part one for before and part 2 for after, however overall it was a smooth read.
Captivating memoir of US astronaut Scott Kelly’s year in the International Space Station and the life events that lead him to that stellar experience. I really appreciated his blunt portrayal of facts and emotion, and several times I wondered how difficult it may have been to reveal some rather sensitive details about himself and family members. For Kelly to go from a reckless youth with terrible grades and an unstable home life to becoming a commander of the space station and serving humanity with knowledge gained by hard work and self sacrifice is inspirational indeed.
Wow. This story was just incredible from the start. My mind was blown reading about all of the space adventures and what it took to be an astronaut. Honestly this book takes you straight to space. I felt like I was hanging out with Scott in space. This book is funny, but also tugs on the heart strings. I am so glad I read this book and I feel my space knowledge has grown so much thanks to it.
Audible | Incredible journey. I'm going to buy my high school nephew this book.
The day this book came out, I got to see Commander Scott Kelly being interviewed by Neil deGrasse Tyson at the American Museum of Natural History in NYC. It was an interesting interview, to say the least. Kelly is a man with a super dry sense of humor, which I quite enjoyed.
His memoir is a no-nonsense account of his year in space, interspersed with the story of his life. I'm unsurprised that this was a book written by someone in the military. Not to say that there isn't anything other than the direct recounting of the story—he gets animated when we talks about some of the really annoying issues he faces while in the ISS, or emotional when he talks about his daughters, for example.
Also, the super dry humor that I mentioned above also sneaks into the book. Blink and you'll miss it but it's certainly there. I thought it was pretty amazing that what you see in person is something that you find in the book. Often that kind of humor is hard to put to a page, in my opinion.
This book is billed as a memoir and it certainly is that. The story of the year Kelly spends in space is interspersed with the story of him growing up and his path to becoming an astronaut. But what I really enjoyed about it is how much I learned about what living on the International Space Station really means. You've probably heard it plenty of times, but it can never be overstressed: Living in space(ish) means that you can never ignore the details, no matter how small. Indeed, the small details are the ones that could kill you. And there's so much we take for granted about living here on Earth, with gravity, so much we never think about, and you just can't live like that in space.
For example, maintaining the CO2 levels can be a Herculean task. If they go up just 1 or 2mm, it can change everything about everyone's mood, cause headaches, impair cognitive function, etc. There's a machine called the Seedra (CDRA: Carbon Dioxide Removal Assembly) which is supposed to remove the CO2 but it constantly breaks down and needs to be fixed. And you can't call the neighborhood SEEDRA repairperson! It's up to the team on board to fix it.
These kinds of details really made the book interesting for me. Another fascinating aspect was the comparison to how the Russians do things. With the space shuttle program in retirement, all trips to and from the ISS are done through Russia's Soyuz vehicles. So at least in terms of the space program, we have a close relationship with Russians, and part of the crew on the ISS is made up of Russians. Kelly is friends with many of them and has spent time in Russia. He often describes the differences between how our 2 countries do things or how those relationships are maintained when things on the (literal) ground are more than rocky. When you're floating 240miles above the surface of the Earth with 5 other people, you have no choice but to get along because relying on each other is literally a matter of life or death.
I highly recommend this book.
Note: I received a copy of this book from Knopf Publishing Group in exchange for an honest review.
His memoir is a no-nonsense account of his year in space, interspersed with the story of his life. I'm unsurprised that this was a book written by someone in the military. Not to say that there isn't anything other than the direct recounting of the story—he gets animated when we talks about some of the really annoying issues he faces while in the ISS, or emotional when he talks about his daughters, for example.
Also, the super dry humor that I mentioned above also sneaks into the book. Blink and you'll miss it but it's certainly there. I thought it was pretty amazing that what you see in person is something that you find in the book. Often that kind of humor is hard to put to a page, in my opinion.
This book is billed as a memoir and it certainly is that. The story of the year Kelly spends in space is interspersed with the story of him growing up and his path to becoming an astronaut. But what I really enjoyed about it is how much I learned about what living on the International Space Station really means. You've probably heard it plenty of times, but it can never be overstressed: Living in space(ish) means that you can never ignore the details, no matter how small. Indeed, the small details are the ones that could kill you. And there's so much we take for granted about living here on Earth, with gravity, so much we never think about, and you just can't live like that in space.
For example, maintaining the CO2 levels can be a Herculean task. If they go up just 1 or 2mm, it can change everything about everyone's mood, cause headaches, impair cognitive function, etc. There's a machine called the Seedra (CDRA: Carbon Dioxide Removal Assembly) which is supposed to remove the CO2 but it constantly breaks down and needs to be fixed. And you can't call the neighborhood SEEDRA repairperson! It's up to the team on board to fix it.
These kinds of details really made the book interesting for me. Another fascinating aspect was the comparison to how the Russians do things. With the space shuttle program in retirement, all trips to and from the ISS are done through Russia's Soyuz vehicles. So at least in terms of the space program, we have a close relationship with Russians, and part of the crew on the ISS is made up of Russians. Kelly is friends with many of them and has spent time in Russia. He often describes the differences between how our 2 countries do things or how those relationships are maintained when things on the (literal) ground are more than rocky. When you're floating 240miles above the surface of the Earth with 5 other people, you have no choice but to get along because relying on each other is literally a matter of life or death.
I highly recommend this book.
Note: I received a copy of this book from Knopf Publishing Group in exchange for an honest review.
If my Wisconsin math is correct, this is my sixth astronaut memoir /biography/ autobiography and I'd rank it in that collection behind only the Sally Ride and Mike Massimino books.
Scott Kelly is the American astronaut selected to spend a year in space aboard the ISS and this is his story of that experience. Actually, the book jumps back and forth between long mission on the ISS and the backstory of how he got there. I found both to be interesting, however, I was much more intrigued by his experiences in space.
I listened to Endurance in audio. Scott's narration was straight ahead and usually without emotion or much inflection, unlike the book self-narrated by astronaut Mike Massimino who is a natural storyteller and hilarious. Still, Scott was a competent storyteller and had a knack for explaining the technical aspects of his life, and did throw some humor in here and there. He named his book Endurance after Shackleton's ship which was destroyed in his ill-fated journey to the South Pole. He brought Shackleton's book to space in order to remind himself that no matter how hard life became in space was it wasn't as bad as what Shackleton's expedition went through.
The times he spent in space including the travel to and from space, were fascinating and covered not only his year-long stint on the ISS, but is first six-month ISS mission as well has his space shuttle missions and trips on the Soyuz. He does a nice job documenting his unique experiences in a relatable way. Scott and his Russian counterpart (who also spent a year on the ISS) were pushed to the physical limits living in zero G for so long and pushed to the mental limits knowing that they were away from friends and loved ones (and the whole damn Earth!) for a year. Scott said several times his biggest fear was that something bad would happen to one of his family members while he was in space as there would be nothing he could do to help. Sure enough, his sister-in-law congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords of AZ was shot in the head during a public appearance in Tucson. All he could do was watch the TV coverage from space. Some of the most interesting parts of the book for me were his comparisons of the Russian and American space agencies. Surprisingly, they both had very different sets of rules and philosophies, not to mention the differences between the Soyuz and the now-retired Space Shuttles.
Some of his terrestrial stories were less interesting, like the unraveling of his marriage and troubles with his daughters. One of the unique things about Scott's time in space was that his identical twin, Mark, was on earth and was Scott's experimental control for the tests about the long term effects of living in space on Scott's body. Their almost identical physiology and DNA could be compared. The book ends shortly after Scott returns to earth so the results of these experiments were not included in the book. I guess that's what Google is for.
One of Scott's final comments was an echo of the messages I've heard from other astronauts: from space the Earth appears to be an oasis in an infinite backdrop of stars and other galaxies, all too far to reach, so we humans need to get our act together and treat it as the special place it is. There is no plan B.
Scott Kelly is the American astronaut selected to spend a year in space aboard the ISS and this is his story of that experience. Actually, the book jumps back and forth between long mission on the ISS and the backstory of how he got there. I found both to be interesting, however, I was much more intrigued by his experiences in space.
I listened to Endurance in audio. Scott's narration was straight ahead and usually without emotion or much inflection, unlike the book self-narrated by astronaut Mike Massimino who is a natural storyteller and hilarious. Still, Scott was a competent storyteller and had a knack for explaining the technical aspects of his life, and did throw some humor in here and there. He named his book Endurance after Shackleton's ship which was destroyed in his ill-fated journey to the South Pole. He brought Shackleton's book to space in order to remind himself that no matter how hard life became in space was it wasn't as bad as what Shackleton's expedition went through.
The times he spent in space including the travel to and from space, were fascinating and covered not only his year-long stint on the ISS, but is first six-month ISS mission as well has his space shuttle missions and trips on the Soyuz. He does a nice job documenting his unique experiences in a relatable way. Scott and his Russian counterpart (who also spent a year on the ISS) were pushed to the physical limits living in zero G for so long and pushed to the mental limits knowing that they were away from friends and loved ones (and the whole damn Earth!) for a year. Scott said several times his biggest fear was that something bad would happen to one of his family members while he was in space as there would be nothing he could do to help. Sure enough, his sister-in-law congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords of AZ was shot in the head during a public appearance in Tucson. All he could do was watch the TV coverage from space. Some of the most interesting parts of the book for me were his comparisons of the Russian and American space agencies. Surprisingly, they both had very different sets of rules and philosophies, not to mention the differences between the Soyuz and the now-retired Space Shuttles.
Some of his terrestrial stories were less interesting, like the unraveling of his marriage and troubles with his daughters. One of the unique things about Scott's time in space was that his identical twin, Mark, was on earth and was Scott's experimental control for the tests about the long term effects of living in space on Scott's body. Their almost identical physiology and DNA could be compared. The book ends shortly after Scott returns to earth so the results of these experiments were not included in the book. I guess that's what Google is for.
One of Scott's final comments was an echo of the messages I've heard from other astronauts: from space the Earth appears to be an oasis in an infinite backdrop of stars and other galaxies, all too far to reach, so we humans need to get our act together and treat it as the special place it is. There is no plan B.
What an amazing autobiography. Scott Kelly tells his story of how he became an astronaut as well as his year long stay on the international space station.
I have read stories and watched documentaries of space travel gone wrong, like Apollo 13, but I was surprised about the amount of disasters or things going wrong and how precarious living in space is. Also, I guess I have taken for granted becoming acclimated to space and becoming acclimated back to earth. Apparently the process and difficult and makes you feel horrible.
I am also surprised at the amount of work the astronauts have each day. I guess I assumed they floated around all day and did nothing. I was surprised how long and exhausting space walks are. Movies make them seem so simple.
Though the book was very technical at times and lacked emotion, I loved Kelly's story.
I have read stories and watched documentaries of space travel gone wrong, like Apollo 13, but I was surprised about the amount of disasters or things going wrong and how precarious living in space is. Also, I guess I have taken for granted becoming acclimated to space and becoming acclimated back to earth. Apparently the process and difficult and makes you feel horrible.
I am also surprised at the amount of work the astronauts have each day. I guess I assumed they floated around all day and did nothing. I was surprised how long and exhausting space walks are. Movies make them seem so simple.
Though the book was very technical at times and lacked emotion, I loved Kelly's story.
Such an amazing book that captivated me in so many ways. How a student who seems incapable of studying can find a way to excel beyond any thought possible, to lessons in sacrifice, obedience, perseverance, and humility. To the extremes of what it takes to become an astronaut.
adventurous
inspiring
reflective
medium-paced